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Billy Frank, Jr., indigenous fighter for sovereign rights, to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom
Billy Frank, Jr., a Nisqually Indian who died last year, is one of two recipients being honored Tuesday with a Presidential Medal of Freedom because they were resisters. The other is Minoru Yasui (who you can read about here).
Frank is best known for his successful fight over Indian fishing rights in Washington state in the 1960s and ‘70s. The right to hunt, fish and gather shellfish were supposedly made permanent in treaties with the tribes of western Washington in the 1850s. But more than a century later, every time Indians fished off their reservations, they would be arrested for violating state law.
Ultimately, the fishing rights matter went to the courts, and in 1974, a federal district court decided in favor of the tribes in U.S. v. Washingon in the Boldt decision. In a powerful ruling Judge George Boldt stated that the Nisqually and other tribes would become co-managers with the state of its fisheries. And they would be allowed to take up to half the salmon in their traditional waters. That ruling was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1979 and it remains, 36 years later, the leading case on Native fishing rights.
When Frank died last year, William Yardley at The New York Times wrote:
Frank is best known for his successful fight over Indian fishing rights in Washington state in the 1960s and ‘70s. The right to hunt, fish and gather shellfish were supposedly made permanent in treaties with the tribes of western Washington in the 1850s. But more than a century later, every time Indians fished off their reservations, they would be arrested for violating state law.
Ultimately, the fishing rights matter went to the courts, and in 1974, a federal district court decided in favor of the tribes in U.S. v. Washingon in the Boldt decision. In a powerful ruling Judge George Boldt stated that the Nisqually and other tribes would become co-managers with the state of its fisheries. And they would be allowed to take up to half the salmon in their traditional waters. That ruling was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1979 and it remains, 36 years later, the leading case on Native fishing rights.
When Frank died last year, William Yardley at The New York Times wrote:
Snip
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2015/11/24/1453794/-Billy-Frank-Jr-indigenous-fighter-for-sovereign-rights-to-receive-Presidential-Medal-of-Freedom
